Literally it's the Akkadian word for the underworld. In this case it's a full-length Serious Sam Classic: The Second Encounter campaign in progress built from scratch by me. My goal is to make a campaign that evokes the feeling you have when you play the Croteam maps. It's not supposed to be a rip-off, but more like a modern Croteam-inspired traditional campaign with my own style.

What does traditional mean?

It means that it's faithful to the style of Croteam's campaign. It will have NETRICSA messages peppered with humor and references like Croteam's. The maps have a lot of secrets (right now there's little over 100, and there's also goofy secrets), plenty of monsters with linearly increasing difficulty over the course of the campaign, so it won't be insanely difficult. Like The First Encounter, it will also have secret levels and the player will keep their weapons indefinitely; they will only be taken away once after the single player intro map. Overall, I hope it'll be a polished and fun experience.

Will it have custom content?

Yes. One particular level will be utilizing a completely new texture set. There will also be a lot of new sounds and music, and even some music from Seriously! members!

How big will it be?

There will be twelve main levels, divided over five chapters. There's also a small single player intro level and two secret levels. In terms of hours, it depends. Some maps will be purely linear, while some maps will feature varying degrees of exploration. One particular level will drop you in a city and give you the objective to collect six items in any order the player chooses, with a lot of optional areas to explore. A quick player might be able to finish the whole campaign in 15 hours, while a slower and thorough player will be busy for anywhere between 20 and 30 hours.

Is co-op supported?

Yes, completely. Not only will every map have co-op markers but there will be a lot of extra enemies added, and some enemies might be replaced by tougher ones as well. Some secrets and areas had to be changed to better accomodate the style and speed of a co-op game. The only exception is the intro map, it features a lot of single-player specific scripting that just doesn't work in co-op so it has been removed from co-op play.

How is the campaign divided?

I'm glad you asked. There's five episodes, each containing anywhere between one and four levels. The levels of an episode are seamlessly connected. This means that the exit of a map leads to the start of the next map as long as they're from the same episode. Below is a rundown on a per-episode basis.

Episode 1:

This episode takes place in Mesopotamia and has a Persepolis theme. It takes place during late morning and the theme of the episode is a big city with a lot of areas visible from other areas through fences. It has three maps.

Episode 2:

This episode has three maps and has the most diverse themes. They range from underground caves to boat rides through valleys and canyons to trekking through ancient ruins.

Episode 3:

This episode is unique, because it's only one map but it's the biggest one by a big margin. The theme is Babylon and it's a huge city to explore, taking place at dusk. You can take any path at any time and your goal is to find all the key items to progress.

Episode 4:

This episode takes place in Egypt, and will have four levels. As the penultimate and biggest episode, it will have the greatest chunk of monsters and will most likely take the longest time to finish. It will take place from dusk until night.

Episode 5:

???

Will it have a story?

You bet it will. The premise is based on the multiverse theory. In The Second Encounter, Serious Sam takes the Time-Lock in the Sun Pyramid and ends up in Ziggurat. After that he travels to the Elephant Square and eventually to the legendary Tower of Babel. Ir-Kalla takes place after Sam escapes Ziggurat. However, in the multiverse where it takes place he doesn't reach the Elephant Square, but instead gets detoured and is sucked into a Time-Lock portal. It takes him to a whole different area in Mesopotamia, far away from his destined path. That's where the campaign begins.

How do I know the campaign won't suck?

You don't. However, I've released a demo of the first level of the Egyptian episode. You can find it here. Read that thread for more details about the demo.

The demo has a secrets guide. Will the full release get the same treatment?

Yes. There will be a guide with all secrets with descriptive text and screenshots in case it's not clear enough.

That's a lot of work, how long has it been in development and will it even be finished?

It has been in development since summer 2012, but only as a timewaster. The idea for a full campaign didn't start until summer 2013 and that's when the plans were fleshed out.

As for a release date, I've always kept the campaign low-profile because I hate to build up expectations if I don't know if I can keep them. There is no definitive release date, but rest assured development hasn't stopped. Making such a long campaign of well-polished maps takes a lot of time, especially for one person. Often I don't work on it for a while due to problems, lack of inspiration or lack of time but I never thought about stopping the project. The release date will be announced when it's time for the final stretch of testing and bugfixing. Check the third post for a development breakdown, and an estimated completion percentage!

Okay, enough text! How about some screenshots?

Yeah, okay. Check the next post for screenshots on a per-episode basis. Click the thumbnail for the full size!

__________________"Is there any better Gerüstbaufirmenvorarbeiterschlüsselanhängerfarbenwasserlöslichkeitskontrollchemiker than discy? No!" -Shrinker
[22:30] Fiendian: Discy, Finzy and Louva shall merge into a superentity known as the Lickyfonz.
"Can we just move Discy's posts to the HOF automatically already? :P" -Jetty

__________________"Is there any better Gerüstbaufirmenvorarbeiterschlüsselanhängerfarbenwasserlöslichkeitskontrollchemiker than discy? No!" -Shrinker
[22:30] Fiendian: Discy, Finzy and Louva shall merge into a superentity known as the Lickyfonz.
"Can we just move Discy's posts to the HOF automatically already? :P" -Jetty

__________________"Is there any better Gerüstbaufirmenvorarbeiterschlüsselanhängerfarbenwasserlöslichkeitskontrollchemiker than discy? No!" -Shrinker
[22:30] Fiendian: Discy, Finzy and Louva shall merge into a superentity known as the Lickyfonz.
"Can we just move Discy's posts to the HOF automatically already? :P" -Jetty

Good to see you around again, man! And that map is looking nice. Makes me really miss the warmth and fullness of color SS1 Classic had. I love the sunset/sunrise lighting. Looking forward to some more shots.

While I do work for Croteam, I'm first of all of this community, so my opinions are my own and do not represent Croteam's views.Unless when I use this nice blue color I totally didn't steal from Blizzard.

Looks like that project you were working on years before. Same Babylonian sunset theme. And yeah, welcome back Disceh.

Actually yes. I wanted to finish that map but I lost it in a hard disk crash and the only back up was ages old. Besides that, I don't know if my taste has shifted that much or it really wasn't that good, but looking back on the version I had the city part was pretty crappy. So I decided to start fresh with that part, and recycle the best part from the indoors area. I also figured I'd start fresh because I'd forgotten so much of SEd over time and I have loads of spare time at the moment to refamiliarize. I'm really satisfied with what I already have, and I hope those of you interested will be too.

__________________"Is there any better Gerüstbaufirmenvorarbeiterschlüsselanhängerfarbenwasserlöslichkeitskontrollchemiker than discy? No!" -Shrinker
[22:30] Fiendian: Discy, Finzy and Louva shall merge into a superentity known as the Lickyfonz.
"Can we just move Discy's posts to the HOF automatically already? :P" -Jetty

I'm mapping for Classic SE because it's so powerful and easy to use at the same time. Plus, it's what I already knew, taking time to learn a whole new Serious Editor would have taken way more time to be worth it for me.

__________________"Is there any better Gerüstbaufirmenvorarbeiterschlüsselanhängerfarbenwasserlöslichkeitskontrollchemiker than discy? No!" -Shrinker
[22:30] Fiendian: Discy, Finzy and Louva shall merge into a superentity known as the Lickyfonz.
"Can we just move Discy's posts to the HOF automatically already? :P" -Jetty

__________________"Is there any better Gerüstbaufirmenvorarbeiterschlüsselanhängerfarbenwasserlöslichkeitskontrollchemiker than discy? No!" -Shrinker
[22:30] Fiendian: Discy, Finzy and Louva shall merge into a superentity known as the Lickyfonz.
"Can we just move Discy's posts to the HOF automatically already? :P" -Jetty

Let's celebrate the fact that my map now almost has 1100 monsters in single player and 1600 in co-op. Hoorah. Flying Biomechs for all.

__________________"Is there any better Gerüstbaufirmenvorarbeiterschlüsselanhängerfarbenwasserlöslichkeitskontrollchemiker than discy? No!" -Shrinker
[22:30] Fiendian: Discy, Finzy and Louva shall merge into a superentity known as the Lickyfonz.
"Can we just move Discy's posts to the HOF automatically already? :P" -Jetty

__________________"Is there any better Gerüstbaufirmenvorarbeiterschlüsselanhängerfarbenwasserlöslichkeitskontrollchemiker than discy? No!" -Shrinker
[22:30] Fiendian: Discy, Finzy and Louva shall merge into a superentity known as the Lickyfonz.
"Can we just move Discy's posts to the HOF automatically already? :P" -Jetty

That's why I am still making shit maps to make the game still alive, you're one of the best mapper.

I think that can only be judged when you play the map. Unless everything is good I'm not satisfied. I draw great inspiration from pompey's work, he has amazing visuals and fights in Otmosis.

But I don't think your maps are shit at all. They don't look bad at all. When you do it more often you get better. Hey, you can always ask me if you don't know how to do something.

__________________"Is there any better Gerüstbaufirmenvorarbeiterschlüsselanhängerfarbenwasserlöslichkeitskontrollchemiker than discy? No!" -Shrinker
[22:30] Fiendian: Discy, Finzy and Louva shall merge into a superentity known as the Lickyfonz.
"Can we just move Discy's posts to the HOF automatically already? :P" -Jetty

__________________"Is there any better Gerüstbaufirmenvorarbeiterschlüsselanhängerfarbenwasserlöslichkeitskontrollchemiker than discy? No!" -Shrinker
[22:30] Fiendian: Discy, Finzy and Louva shall merge into a superentity known as the Lickyfonz.
"Can we just move Discy's posts to the HOF automatically already? :P" -Jetty

Also, when your mod gets to the production phase and I have the time/interest, maybe you could have use for my mapping skills.

__________________"Is there any better Gerüstbaufirmenvorarbeiterschlüsselanhängerfarbenwasserlöslichkeitskontrollchemiker than discy? No!" -Shrinker
[22:30] Fiendian: Discy, Finzy and Louva shall merge into a superentity known as the Lickyfonz.
"Can we just move Discy's posts to the HOF automatically already? :P" -Jetty

Thanks, I will but that won't be soon, I want to finish all the weapons, after that all the enemies, and leave the maps for last so that all the entities will be working and ready to put into the maps.

Holy shit, you're right. Maybe I subconsciously drew inspiration from that pic. The resemblance is uncanny...

__________________"Is there any better Gerüstbaufirmenvorarbeiterschlüsselanhängerfarbenwasserlöslichkeitskontrollchemiker than discy? No!" -Shrinker
[22:30] Fiendian: Discy, Finzy and Louva shall merge into a superentity known as the Lickyfonz.
"Can we just move Discy's posts to the HOF automatically already? :P" -Jetty

Thanks, I will but that won't be soon, I want to finish all the weapons, after that all the enemies, and leave the maps for last so that all the entities will be working and ready to put into the maps.